


The Daytime Imprint of the Moon

by Maple_Maypole



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Afterlife, Grizzop was so fiercely himself, Then itd be him, a short little thing of me trying to articulate my very specific hc, if anyone is going to change the realm of a godess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:48:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23653357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maple_Maypole/pseuds/Maple_Maypole
Summary: A forest and its echoes.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 27





	The Daytime Imprint of the Moon

In a forest far from our eyes, far from fields, islands or oceans, the echo of footsteps sounds through the leaves.

It's not a gentle sound. It's a quick and steady heartbeat announcing its intent, it vibrates through every branch and every rock and finds a home deep in the heavy earth beneath it.

It's purposeful and proud, glinting boldly with silver moonlight and shining brightest even amidst a bed of stars. If this faraway forest had a place for fear then it would pierce the heart of those unlucky enough to recognize the sound.

Time as we know it does not pass in this forest. Only the Moon is visible and only the Moon is needed, lighting a path wherever a path is required and providing cloaks of shadow with a silence as fixed and definite as the universe above and around them.

The trees raise their arms up to the sky and a blur moves under them, its red eyes full of purpose and confidence in the love this forest is made of, full of belief on the creak of its bow and the string going taut, the joyous whisper in an arrow's point as it splits the air, on the hands that hold and hunt.

Beats anew a heartbeat that stopped once in a flurry of pain and love and loss, with a confidence like the wind through the feathers on its arrows and the conversations of the rivers around it...

But it is, after all, an echo.

Even if it is too precious, too fierce to fade.

Time as we know it does not pass in this forest. The ticking clock cannot be heard and the end line is behind them, the little hand points forward and the big hand points up. There is no fear of endings in this place that is both an after and a now. That is a gift for the ones left behind.

Here there is moonlight, and pride, and memories that hold no words but seep into every crevice of the world and fill it with light and warmth and, occasionally, just a little sadness.

And though time does not pass and there are no human ears to hear it, the echo will join the dance of the forest more and more fully, inextricably tied to the whistling winds and the glittering darkness and the rich green of the plants.

And this is what's next:

The footsteps will no longer be heard. They will not be gone.

One last arrow will be shot. It will strike true.

The forest will been seen by new eyes, the wind will play with new strands of hair. New heartbeats will find themselves echoing up the branches until they can almost touch the Moon.

And something will echo in every fistful of dirt, in every riverbed and every falling leaf and every rustle of the bushes. A glint of red between the trees, the ghost of a grin as you look at the sky. It will make the path just a little clearer, and those new feet will want to go just a little quicker.

Hurry along, the forest will say, in a voice that is just as sharp as it always was. No time to lose.

Somewhere far away, the wind plays in a field. A woman laughs and plays with a knife for no reason other than the joy it brings her and the kids around her.

Somewhere far away, a man in purple robes looks at the raging ocean in front of him and feels fear. Beside him, an equally scared woman squeezes his hand. It looks very tiny in hers. He squeezes back.

Two others hang back- a wild-haired alchemist tastes the salt in the air and registers it with fondness in their chest as the taste of home. Next to them, a man looks at the sky and doesn't pray. Instead, he tightens the knots on their makeshift inbarcation and hopes it's enough.

This is what's next, they all think, twinged with uncertainty. The trying, the hoping, the squeezing of hands. This is the gift of those whose hearts still beat with their original song.

All around them, a very special echo thrums in the air and the salt and the wheat. Some feel it more than others, but all their hearts answer in kind.

It urges them to care, to try, and to hurry the hell up.

**Author's Note:**

> This was fun! Thank you for reading.


End file.
